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In one of my recent assignments for the Fredericksburg Standard-Radio Post, I spent time reporting on a group of Chinese tourists who were in town recently. Having spent eight months from 1996-1997 studying the Chinese Basic Course at Defense Language Institute (Mandarin Chinese, specifically), it was a thrilling assignment.

As I took pictures, I listened to them talk. My Mandarin is very rusty, even much more so than my Russian, but I could pick up words here and there as they tried on cowboy hats. I would learn during the interview that cowboy hats aren’t common in China. They’re mostly worn for fashion purposes by women, and among men, they’re more popular among the artistic types. Surely, there are cattle in China. It makes me wonder what the niu zai in China wear, and, looking back, I regret not asking. Interviews tend to be quick and to the point when you’re doing it mostly through a translator.

Still, a few times I got to show off what Chinese I can still speak — much to the group’s satisfaction:

你们好!

How you’d say hello to a group of people. They immediately smiled and responded back, “你好!”

They sounded pleasantly surprised that an American could speak Chinese.

So, I decided to introduce myself…

“我叫 Richard.”

Later, they wanted me to tell them how I could speak Chinese, but they wanted me to speak in Chinese.

They all laughed. Heartily. It’s a phrase you say to a waiter in a Chines restaurant when you’d like to have chopsticks.

Finally, I wrote down the name I was assigned when I studied Chinese. My given first and last name is Richard Zowie, and in Chinese, I was known as Zuo Ruicha. Or:

左瑞查

Side note: one of my teachers at DLI at the Presidio of Monterey, California, was Wang Lao Shi (Lao Shi means “teacher.”) Her full given name, last name then first name, was Wang Manglin. She would probably be in her sixties now. If anyone knows where she is, please let me know. I’d love to chat with her again.